Growing old and staying connected: touch screen technology for ameliorating older people’s experience of social isolation. Social isolation affects many older people. This project investigates novel technologies to prevent and to ameliorate social isolation experienced by older adults. This project will implement and trial a software application over an 18 month period, using a 3G connected touch-screen tablet, and evaluate its impact on alleviating social isolation.
An internet-based intervention program for distress associated with tinnitus in an industrial setting. This project involves a randomised controlled trial of an internet-based intervention for distress associated with tinnitus in an industrial setting. This study is significant because it is the first to investigate the effectiveness of an internet-based program for workers with tinnitus living in metropolitan, regional and rural areas of Australia and New Zealand. Changes will be assessed on wo ....An internet-based intervention program for distress associated with tinnitus in an industrial setting. This project involves a randomised controlled trial of an internet-based intervention for distress associated with tinnitus in an industrial setting. This study is significant because it is the first to investigate the effectiveness of an internet-based program for workers with tinnitus living in metropolitan, regional and rural areas of Australia and New Zealand. Changes will be assessed on work performance (e.g. job satisfaction), tinnitus-related distress, negative affect, and quality of life. It is expected that workers accessing the internet-based intervention will show significant improvements on all measures at post-intervention with improvements maintained at six-month follow up.Read moreRead less
Coordination and communication in critical care: Assessing potential technology support. This project will examine temporal coordination demands of busy critical care environments, with the goal of developing better models and tools for evaluating the impact of information and communication technology (ICT) innovation. Millions of dollars can be wasted on healthcare ICT updates when the nature of critical care work, the means of communication, and temporal coordination demands are not fully unde ....Coordination and communication in critical care: Assessing potential technology support. This project will examine temporal coordination demands of busy critical care environments, with the goal of developing better models and tools for evaluating the impact of information and communication technology (ICT) innovation. Millions of dollars can be wasted on healthcare ICT updates when the nature of critical care work, the means of communication, and temporal coordination demands are not fully understood. The outcome of this project will be better conceptual and computational tools for assessing the impact of ICT innovation on safety-critical systems such as healthcare, so providing more cost-effective ICT solutions where there is rapidly-evolving ICT innovation.Read moreRead less
Ageing Bodies, Embodied Interactions and Social Inclusion. This project aims to design and investigate innovative technologies to establish meaningful social connections between older people who are constrained by limited mobility. Older adults who participate in social activities benefit from enhanced wellbeing, but social groups are often inaccessible for those in advanced old age, especially if living in rural areas. Emerging technologies, such as depth cameras and body tracking, can be used ....Ageing Bodies, Embodied Interactions and Social Inclusion. This project aims to design and investigate innovative technologies to establish meaningful social connections between older people who are constrained by limited mobility. Older adults who participate in social activities benefit from enhanced wellbeing, but social groups are often inaccessible for those in advanced old age, especially if living in rural areas. Emerging technologies, such as depth cameras and body tracking, can be used to augment limited bodily movement via avatars. These can be represented in virtual communities to foster social inclusion. The expected outcome of this project is a new technology that uses whole-body interactions and representational avatars to improve social inclusion for older adults in rural and urban settings.Read moreRead less
Positive Computing: The design of technologies that support psychological wellbeing. Designing future technology to foster psychological wellbeing has the potential to affect population-wide positive change. The design of software like apps or social media, can impact things like cyber-bullying, depression, or even foster resilience. This project aims to connect experts across multiple disciplines (psychology, technology and policy) to develop pioneering methods, knowledge, and strategies that w ....Positive Computing: The design of technologies that support psychological wellbeing. Designing future technology to foster psychological wellbeing has the potential to affect population-wide positive change. The design of software like apps or social media, can impact things like cyber-bullying, depression, or even foster resilience. This project aims to connect experts across multiple disciplines (psychology, technology and policy) to develop pioneering methods, knowledge, and strategies that will allow future technologies to play an active role in improving health, performance, and quality of life for all Australians, through research-based design for wellbeing. In doing so, Australia will lead the way on the technological front in a growing global initiative to improve the wellbeing of nations.Read moreRead less
Enhancing patient management and clinical systems in hospital ward settings using mobile, wireless technologies. Wireless networks, hand held devices and associated applications are key emerging technologies. This project will investigate the implementation of wireless devices and applications for patient administration at Southern Health in two ward settings (neurology and neurosurgery) at Monash Medical Centre. A wireless infrastructure is being installed and clinical staff will be able to c ....Enhancing patient management and clinical systems in hospital ward settings using mobile, wireless technologies. Wireless networks, hand held devices and associated applications are key emerging technologies. This project will investigate the implementation of wireless devices and applications for patient administration at Southern Health in two ward settings (neurology and neurosurgery) at Monash Medical Centre. A wireless infrastructure is being installed and clinical staff will be able to conduct their rounds with notebook computers or PDAs at the patients' bedside. The research team will assess the acceptance of the new devices and applications by nursing and medical staff. Outcomes from the project will include a set of guidelines and techniques for introducing and managing technology-enhanced patient administration and clinical systems.Read moreRead less
Quantifying intake of food prepared outside home during emerging adulthood. This project aims to explore the role that food prepared outside the home versus within the home plays in the diets of young adults. The project plans to use data mining to understand where, when and with whom young adults buy food, and the nutritional composition and overall contribution to diet of these foods. The project will use a newly designed and tested Smartphone application to transform data collection and proce ....Quantifying intake of food prepared outside home during emerging adulthood. This project aims to explore the role that food prepared outside the home versus within the home plays in the diets of young adults. The project plans to use data mining to understand where, when and with whom young adults buy food, and the nutritional composition and overall contribution to diet of these foods. The project will use a newly designed and tested Smartphone application to transform data collection and processing, and enable continuous digital photography. The knowledge gained is intended to form the evidence base for formulation of policy and electronic and mobile-health promotion to reverse the problem of young adults gaining more weight than any other group in Australia.Read moreRead less
Interruptions, work coordination, and resilience. Evidence is emerging of an association between the number of workplace interruptions that hospital clinicians experience and outcomes such as clinical errors that could cause patient harm. However there is still no direct evidence that interruptions cause clinical errors. This project seeks such evidence, but also views interruptions as an integral part of normal work coordination. This project investigates the origin and need for interruptions, ....Interruptions, work coordination, and resilience. Evidence is emerging of an association between the number of workplace interruptions that hospital clinicians experience and outcomes such as clinical errors that could cause patient harm. However there is still no direct evidence that interruptions cause clinical errors. This project seeks such evidence, but also views interruptions as an integral part of normal work coordination. This project investigates the origin and need for interruptions, tests causal connections between interruptions and errors, and explores workplace improvements as a means to handle concerns about interruptions. This research will provide a solid basis from which clinical leaders can formulate policy about distractions and interruptions in the healthcare workplace. Read moreRead less
Discovery Early Career Researcher Award - Grant ID: DE210101107
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$412,744.00
Summary
Ahead of the Game: Balancing the Gaming Industry and Public Interest. This project battles the risks and embraces the benefits of digital gaming. There is a risk that one loses control of their gaming and prioritises it over other duties. This is offset by the benefits of using digital games for health. It is the first to decode and use the health data embedded in the connection between the gamer and their game persona (avatar). It does this by concurrently assessing important gamer, family, cul ....Ahead of the Game: Balancing the Gaming Industry and Public Interest. This project battles the risks and embraces the benefits of digital gaming. There is a risk that one loses control of their gaming and prioritises it over other duties. This is offset by the benefits of using digital games for health. It is the first to decode and use the health data embedded in the connection between the gamer and their game persona (avatar). It does this by concurrently assessing important gamer, family, cultural and game structure features. Findings will prompt the ethical growth of the Australian Health games industry and inform strategies to combat gaming disorder by tailoring games to users' needs. This will uniquely benefit Australians by re-directing this growing industry to better serve the public interest.Read moreRead less
Discovery Early Career Researcher Award - Grant ID: DE220100847
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$394,868.00
Summary
RECONNECT ME: REgaining CONtrol of childreN’s EleCTronic MEdia . This project aims to understand the impact that screen behaviours have on children’s quality of life, social skills and family functioning, and co-design feasible, acceptable and effective behavioural and digital strategies to mitigate this impact. Parents are concerned and are seeking urgent help in the persistent and evolving technology climate, where previous strategies are no longer relevant. Expected outcomes include new knowl ....RECONNECT ME: REgaining CONtrol of childreN’s EleCTronic MEdia . This project aims to understand the impact that screen behaviours have on children’s quality of life, social skills and family functioning, and co-design feasible, acceptable and effective behavioural and digital strategies to mitigate this impact. Parents are concerned and are seeking urgent help in the persistent and evolving technology climate, where previous strategies are no longer relevant. Expected outcomes include new knowledge of the impact of screen time, and the co-design of innovative and user-friendly strategies developed with families, for families, to manage this. The benefits will include informing future effective and scalable screen time strategies for improved quality of life, social skills, family functioning outcomes.Read moreRead less